Chapter Twenty-Six: Emma

A/N: I know I keep saying chapters are my favorites, but seriously, guys... I mean it this time. This chapter is my favorite.

***

Kidnap My Heart

Chapter 26: Emma

The downside of being frightened to tears: being frightened to tears. The upside of being frightened to tears: receiving special treatment because the person who scared you felt bad about what they did.

I had a feeling there was a little more to it. I had a feeling Will was trying to sedate me into giving up this war, but I was okay with that.

He pretty much just tiptoed around me all day the next day and tried to make up for what he did. I couldn’t say I was complaining. He brought me breakfast in bed, made me lunch, let me watch the Grey’s Anatomy marathon that came on Lifetime, gave me a back massage, brushed my hair, and basically did anything I asked. It was great. I didn’t even care if he had ulterior motives. I was enjoying this treatment way too much.

Even Eric was abnormally nice to me—and Taylor. She’d gotten mad at him for being Will’s accomplice the other night and gave him the silent treatment for a while. It didn’t take Taylor too long to forgive him. They were back to laughing away at their little inside jokes in no time. Ugh.

After I’d settled into bed around eleven o’clock, I glanced over at Will. “Can you get me a glass of water?”

“On it,” he said, scrambling up off of his makeshift bed on the floor. He passed Taylor on his way out the door.

A smirk fell on my lips. “Told you he was my bitch.”

Taylor giggled and covered her mouth. “I can’t believe he’s actually doing everything you ask. I think—I think he might like you, Emmy.” Her voice turned into a whisper when she voiced this last sentence aloud. She glanced over her shoulder to make sure he wasn’t behind her. He wasn’t.

“More like he’s trying to get on my good side so I won’t do anything to him,” I said with a chuckle. Will didn’t like me; he barely put up with me. The only part of me he was interested in was my looks and that didn’t mean anything to me.

Taylor didn’t get a chance to reply. Will came back with a glass of water in hand and looked between us, as if that would help him figure out what we were talking about. Like we were going to tell him.

“I’m gonna head to bed.” Taylor shot me a look that made me want to throw my pillow at her and slowly walked away. The thing about my best friend was that she lived in Taylor-World. She lived in the clouds. She blurred fantasy with reality.

I took the glass from Will and sat up in bed. I appeared to be completely calm on the outside, but on the inside, I was still seething. Just thinking about what Will did made me angry. I didn’t know who I was really angry at—him or me. He was the one who had pulled the prank, but I was the idiot who had fallen for it. I was just as stupid and gullible as he was.

“Can I ask you a question?”

I took a sip of my water. “Shoot.”

“Why are you so calm? It’s freaking me out.”

I smiled into the glass. “Is it?” After taking another sip, I set the glass down between my legs. “I don’t know. This prank war isn’t fun anymore. I guess I’m just ending the fight before someone gets really hurt.”

“Maybe that’s for the best.”

I set the glass on the nightstand and settled back down in the bed. “Maybe. Can you get the lights?”

“Yeah, of course,” he said, standing up.

The lights being shut off should have been his signal to shut up and go to sleep, but he took it the opposite way. He took it as a signal to start running his mouth.

As he was chatting away, going with my calm façade and attempting to make peace, I came to a decision. The best revenge wouldn’t be found in a prank. Pranks were entertaining, but they wouldn’t be fulfilling anymore. No, the best revenge would be to escape and leave them with no ransom. No me and Taylor, no money. It was that simple.

Besides, I was starting to get a little too comfortable here. Maybe not comfortable, exactly… it was more like I was getting used to the circumstances. I was starting to adapt. And if I was starting to adapt, there were no words for Taylor. My best friend seemed to have forgotten that she was being held hostage. She acted like this situation was the most natural thing in the world, like living with Eric was totally normal. But it wasn’t. He wasn’t her boyfriend, and they hadn’t made a mutual decision to move in together. Eric had kidnapped her and forced her to stay here. That was the reality, and it was time Taylor faced it. It was time she got out of this mess. We needed to escape before it was too late.

***

Stage 1 of my new plan began the very next day. After breakfast, I stopped Will and Eric from leaving the table so I could talk to them.

“What’s up?” Will asked, furrowing his eyebrows.

“Taylor and I have been talking, and we’ve come to an agreement,” I said. “We’re tired of living like men. We need our femininity back.”

Will and Eric exchanged a look before Will responded. “Your femininity back? I didn’t realize you guys had grown dicks while living here.”

“We may as well have,” I exclaimed. I continued, ticking off each argument as I went. “Eating junk, wearing your clothes, being force to hang out with you guys all of the time… It’s revolting.”

When they looked at Taylor to see if I was the only one with complaints, she turned red. “Yeah, I kinda miss looking like a girl…” She trailed off.

Will huffed. “Okay, we don’t force you guys to hang out with us.”

I shot him a look. “You follow us around all day and barely let us go to the bathroom by ourselves.”

“That’s not relevant.”

“Whatever. That’s not the point. The point is that we’re going nuts. I’m pretty sure I’ve gained a dress size, but guess what? I wouldn’t know because I don’t have any dresses to wear.”

He rolled his eyes. “Rage, you look the same as you did when you came here. You haven’t gained a pound.”

I knew I probably hadn’t gained much if I’d gained anything at all, but it made for a good argument. Weight was generally a touchy subject with girls, and most guys didn’t want to veer into that direction at all.

“How would you know? All I wear is your clothes, and they’re obviously not my size. You’re huge.”

“And you look fine in them,” he said, his lips turning upwards. “Better than fine. Don’t worry about it, Rage.”

Why couldn’t he let me complain without shooting down my arguments with nice words? God. Regardless, I went on and insisted. I wasn’t taking no for an answer. This was crucial to the plan. “Squilliam, we are women and we want to dress like women. Go buy us some clothes.”

He shot me an incredulous look. Eric’s facial expression mirrored his brother’s. “Are you serious?” Will asked.

“Yes.”

“Do I need to remind you why we’re stuck with each other in the first place?”

Because you and your dad are greedy bastards and want my dad’s money. “Because you took us from our homes and ruined our lives,” I said.

“Technically, we took you from a gas station.”

“Rest stop.”

“Same thing.”

I looked at him. “Not really.”

Eric interrupted us impatiently. “Alright, we’ll buy you guys some clothes, but you’re not going anywhere, and I think that’s what you’re really getting at.”

My mouth dropped open. God-freaking-damn it. “You guys have no faith in me. I just want to get out of this house for a little.”

Eric shook his head. “Do you think we’re stupid?”

Yes. “What if Will and I go? I’ll pick out some things for both me and Taylor. I know what she likes.”

He still wasn’t convinced. “Not happening.”

Come on. This was the least he could do after betraying me twice. First he told Will about his haunting because he was a sadistic little shit who wanted to make sure he was there when Will found out and thought his reaction would be funnier than the actual prank. Then he teamed up with Will to play that stupid prank on me. He owed me.

“Do you really think I’d run and leave Taylor behind? Do you really think I’d do anything to endanger her while I’m out of the house?”

Eric hesitated and glanced at Taylor. “I guess you wouldn’t.” After a few more seconds, he nodded. “Alright, you guys go. We’ll stay here.”

***

The car ride was slightly awkward at first. Will kept glancing over at me, and it kind of made me think he was waiting for me to try to jump out of the car and make a break for it. Then again, it might have been because I was wearing a disguise that made me look like a male hippie, wig included.

The silence started to drive me insane. It was weird. Will was rarely silent. Besides, there was a perfectly good radio right in front of me. Why not put it to good use? “What kind of music is your least favorite?”

“Country.” He sounded mistrustful. “Why?”

I didn’t answer. Instead, I switched the radio on to the most annoying country station I could find: the Bluegrass Country station. The look on Will’s face cracked me up; he definitely wasn’t a country person.

With a groan, he reached for the switch to turn off the radio, but I was somehow quicker and immediately slapped his hand away. He just groaned again. “I should’ve known better than to answer that question. It seemed harmless…”

“Your mistake,” I replied with a cheeky grin.

I cranked up the music and left it like that for a good thirty minutes. I barely paid attention to the music; I paid more attention to my surroundings, to how long it took to get to town. After a while, though, the music started seeping into my pores and invading my brain and I had to switch the station.

It took two hours to get to town and another fifteen to get to the nearest mall, and that was mostly because Will liked to drive fast. There was no way Taylor and I were going to get away on foot.

“Alright, we’re setting some ground rules before we go in,” Will said as he turned off the ignition. “Don’t wander away. Stick with me at all times or you’re never getting out of the house again. Don’t grab anything that’s not on sale, and I’m talking clearance, Rage. I’m talking seventy to ninety percent off. If it’s anything under seventy, we walk. Got it?”

The look on my face must have been pretty horrified. “That’s ridiculous. Where am I supposed to find clearance like that?”

“I don’t know. You’re the girl here. I’m just the one paying.”

He must have brought what, twenty dollars? This was ridiculous. I usually loved shopping, but I had a feeling this was going to be the worst shopping spree I ever went on.

As we walked inside, my eyes took in my surroundings. I hoped I would remember most of what I saw. I had no way of jotting down any notes without creating suspicion.

It didn’t take me very long to realize there were two kinds of shopping trips. In fact, it barely took me half an hour to realize this.

The first kind was the kind I was used to: you took a few hours to treat yourself to a few new outfits, or maybe you took advantage of the weekend and went on a huge shopping spree. My dad gave me one of his credit cards, and I was allowed to use it whenever I wanted as long as I didn’t buy something like a new car without asking him. I was well acquainted with this kind of shopping trip.

The second kind was one I’d never encountered until I went to the mall with Will. You focused less on maxing out your credit card and more on having a good time, even if you made a fool of yourself in the process. No, especially if you made a fool of yourself in the process.

My best guy friend, Aaron, was kind of weird and stupid, but he was nowhere near this level of weird and stupid. In a matter of a few hours, Will managed to make me laugh harder than I’d ever laughed in my life.

First he fished a few coins out of the wishing fountain in the middle of the mall, claiming he was “rerouting the luck” to himself. He tried to get me to ride the mechanical horses they had for kids with those coins, but I drew the line there.

Then he made us go in the pet store just so he could go look at the parrots and teach them swear words to make them “unsellable.”

Then he went to the video game store and played every demo game they had there, making explosion noises as he did so, claiming it “added to the game.”

When we passed by the food court after leaving the video game store, Will headed straight to the guy with the samples to grab a tiny sample of orange chicken. This wasn’t the problem. No, the problem arose when he sneezed on the sample tray and then offered to ingest its now undesirable contents.

I covered my mouth to try to stifle my laughter as we walked away from the food court. “Will, that’s disgusting. I can’t believe he gave them to you instead of throwing them away. That has to breaking some sort of health code. You’re insane.”

He grinned over at me and stuffed the last piece in his mouth, almost swallowing the tiny toothpick in the process. He threw his garbage into the trash as we walked away. “When you’re broke like me, you find new ways to amuse yourself at the store. Come on. We can head to some actual stores now.”

He grabbed me by the hand and led me over to some cheap looking store. I didn’t let go of his hand, mostly because I wanted to see what he would say when I made my next comment. I looked at our hands pointedly and then looked back at him. “You do realize I’m dressed like a guy, right? And an ugly one at that?”

I had hippie hair thanks to the wig I had on, and I was wearing a baseball hat, a baggy t-shirt, and rolled up sweatpants. Not to mention the fake sideburns and eyebrows. I wasn’t looking cute at all. It was a wonder I hadn’t flashed anybody yet. Those sweatpants were barely staying up.

Will shrugged. “Who cares? I know there’s a pretty girl underneath the wig and clothes, and that’s all that matters.”

That was… that was strangely nice… “There’s a, uh, clearance rack over here,” I said, awkwardly nodding towards a clothing rack with a huge clearance sign over it. And yes, people were, in fact, staring at us. “Let’s go.”

I was the one who led him over this time, but I let go of his hand when I reached the clothing rack. I needed both hands to look through the clothes. Plus, the staring was starting to grate my nerves. It was mostly judgmental girls that were giving us dirty looks. The look in their eyes screamed, “What the hell is a hot guy like him doing with a weirdo dude like that guy?” It made me want to rip off the wig and put on my usual chic attire so they could see that it was the other way around. He was the one I would’ve been embarrassed of under normal circumstances.

While I was distractedly searching through the racks, Will disappeared. “Will?” I glanced around. What the hell? He wouldn’t leave me here, would he?

I left the clearance section to look for him; I found him in the fitting room. He’d tried on a pair of jeans backwards and decided to ask the salesperson if they made his butt look big. How I held in my laughter long enough to see the salesperson give him a weird look and walk away, I wasn’t sure.

As soon as the guy left, I burst out laughing. “You’re freaking stupid.”

He glanced down at himself before looking back up at me. His electrifying eyes looked into mine, and his next words made me freeze. “I like it when you laugh.”

My laughter faded and I mentally stumbled as I attempted to find a suitable response that wouldn’t make me want to shoot myself in the foot. “Even when I’m laughing at you?”

“I like to tell myself you’re laughing with me, not at me.”

“Right… You keep telling yourself that.”

“Don’t worry.” He retreated back into the stall he’d changed in. “I will.”

I made him go back to the clearance racks with me after he put his pants back on, and I actually found a few cute things that fit his criteria. They were cheap, but they were still pretty cute.

Taylor and I were basically the same size, so finding clothes for her wasn’t too hard. There was one shirt that I thought would’ve looked better in green, so I sent Will to ask if they had any. I regretted sending him when he informed me he’d asked the guy if they had the shirt in “poop green” and had been sent away.

We hit a few more stores before calling it a day. In the end, we bought two pairs of jeans, two pairs of yoga pants, a pair of yoga shorts which he insisted I keep for myself, two t-shirts, two tank tops, and two pairs of cheap, knock-off tennis shoes. Thanks to Will’s insistence on finding the sales and his strategic use of coupons, we didn’t even spend $100. He even let me buy a few hair products because we’d spent so little on clothes.

I’d never gone shopping and spent so little, but I didn’t feel like the trip had been a waste. I’d had just as much fun as I did when I shopped with my dad’s credit card.

Right as we were leaving the mall, I caught sight of a large, blue photo booth with red curtains. I should’ve just walked by it without giving it a second glance, but… “Do you have three dollars to spare?”

Will stopped walking. “Sure. Why?”

I didn’t say anything; I just nodded at the photo booth.

A slow smile spread across his face. It was a smile that lit up his entire face. “What, you wanna take some pictures with me?”

I shrugged. “I like photo booths. Don’t make me change my mind.”

I could’ve made up some bullshit excuse as to why I wanted the pictures, but deep down, I would’ve known the truth, so why even bother? Against all odds, I’d had a good day with Will. I’d genuinely enjoyed myself on what was supposed to be a trip with an underhanded purpose. I was planning on leaving soon, but I wanted a small token of our day at the mall. It didn’t really make sense to me, but it was the truth. I wanted to remember this day. I wanted him to remember this day.

Will pretended to zip his lips shut and wordlessly walked over to the photo booth with me in tow. He stuck three dollars into the machine and we went inside, setting our bags on the floor.

“Wait a second,” I said, holding up a hand. “Don’t touch anything yet.”

I didn’t want to be in disguise when we took the pictures. I wanted the pictures to depict me the way Will had seen me, not the way the rest of the mall had seen me. After I’d removed the hat, wig, sideburns, and eyebrows and fixed up my hair a bit, I turned to face Will. “How do I look? Like a girl again?”

“You look beautiful.”

I shouldn’t have asked him. “Then we can start now.”

There was a computer screen on the left where we could choose from options like backgrounds and the number of photos we wanted. I chose the standard whitish-greyish background and five photos in classic photo booth format—one picture below the other on a thin strip of photo paper.

We got into position, making sure we were within the viewing area of the camera, and then the timer began.

5… 4… 3…

“Wait, I don’t know what I want to do,” Will said in a panicky voice.

2… 1…

Snap!

I’d smiled for that first one, but I had no idea what Will had done. I could see why his driver’s license picture had turned out so bad.

5… 4….

“Oh, screw it,” Will said, grabbing me and pulling me onto his lap.

3… 2…

“Will!” I screamed, laughing when his hand accidentally brushed my stomach and tickled me.

1… Snap!

“What?” he asked. His face was so close to mine, but backing up wasn’t really an option. He had a tight grip on me.

5… 4…

Instead of telling him he’d accidentally tickled me, I said the first thing that popped into my mind. It was the only thing that had crossed my mind when I started looking into his eyes. “I like your eyes.”

3… 2…

“Me too. I mean, yours. I like yours.”

1… Snap!

For the next picture, Will and I both leaned in really close to the camera at the same time. It was like we’d had the same idea. I wasn’t sure what face he was making, but I was making a weird smile that made me look like I had dimples. I didn’t normally have dimples.

5… 4… 3… 2… 1… Snap!

“Last one,” I said, leaning back. I’d pretty much forgotten I was still sitting on Will, at least until I leaned back.

5…

“This is, uh, for science,” Will said, a half smile curving one side of his mouth upwards. “Or for the children? I don’t know.”

4… 3…

“What?” What on earth was he talking about?

2… 1…

And then he leaned in and kissed me. It wasn’t a big kiss. No open mouths or roaming hands or anything like that. But it was still a kiss. And it still shocked the hell out of me.

Snap!

I quickly pulled away once the shutter had gone off. “What the hell was that?”

He shrugged. “It was the last picture and I was out of ideas. Except for that one. Plus, I figured we might as well make the last one memorable.”

I nodded slowly. “Right. For science.”

“For science.”

It was the dumbest excuse I’d ever heard in my life, but I was okay with taking it. It was better than digging deeper and diving into uncharted territory. No, thank you.

I put the disguise back on before exiting the booth. I was glad I’d taken it off for the pictures; that disguise would’ve made for the most awkward pictures ever.

Our snapshots were just starting to print when I left the booth. One long, narrow strip of photo paper slid out of the slot in the front of the machine, and then another. Will and I each grabbed one.

In the first photo, I was smiling. Will… not so much. He had this weird, surprised look on his face that made me laugh.

In the second one, I was facing Will as I laughed and tried to lean away from him. He’d lost the weird look and looked more like a human being again—a happy one.

In the third one, we were scarily close to each other and had our eyes completely focused on each other. It was… frightening.

In the fourth one, I was making my awkward dimple smile, and Will had a creepy pedophile smile. The funny thing was that we hadn’t even planned it. “Will, you look like a pedo.” I snorted and pointed at the fourth photo, and he laughed.

In the fifth one, Will was kissing me. Obviously. Except it looked like I was kissing back, and I hadn’t kissed him back. At least, I didn’t think I had. It was so quick, though. It was just a blurry flash in my mind. In fact, it was so quick that I probably wouldn’t have really remembered it had it not been for this picture. But now there was concrete proof. I’d made sure of it, and there was no denying that it had happened.

You could just rip it up. Rip them both up. Destroy all evidence.

I looked down at the strip of photos. I could get rid of them. But I didn’t want to. I didn’t want Will to think I was some sadistic girl who reveled in ruining nice moments, especially when they were rare ones like this one.

We headed back to the car; when I climbed inside, I searched through the compartments for a pen and found one way in the back.

“What are you doing?” Will asked.

“Dating the pictures,” I said. I flipped the picture around and wrote on the back: 3-24-13.

He stared at the date. “Pretty sure it’s 2014, Rage.”

I rolled my eyes. “I know. Let me see yours.”

He gave it to me, and I wrote the same thing on his and handed it back.

“Why 2013?”

“We could misplace these pictures someday.”

He raised both eyebrows. “And?”

“Being with me in March of 2013 is no big deal. Being with me in March of 2014 is.”

A knowing look crossed his face. “You don’t want me to get in trouble.”

No. No, I guess I didn’t.